"As good as other facial expression books have been in the past, my onecomplaint with all of them has been that they don't feel genuine. Theyaren't real expressions. It's people off the street approximating whatan angry or surprised look is. They also don't take into considerationbody language. (I guess that's two complaints - sorry I miscounted.)Where this book has the advantage over the others, is that the photosare of trained actors: Rosie Perez, Hume Cronyn, James Cromwell, JasonAlexander, to name a few. And the expressions are set up more likescenes. The actor wasn't told, "Look angry! Now infuriated!! Okay, nowgive me bashful." Instead the director said, "You are a man who hasjust been told he has inoperable cancer." or "You are a devoted fatherwatching your handicapped daughter receive her high-school diploma."

The results are incredible."

The book sounds like a super resource for any student of character animation . (anything to make animators look further afield for fresh, authentic expressions and not recycle that same ol' "furrowed-eyebrows-and-pouty-lip" thing and stuff like that which we've seen ad nauseum ad infinitum ... and I include myself as the chief of sinners in that regard)

Comments

Fun character, Dave! And what a great expression. This would be a great character to take and emmulate a bunch of expressions from the "Actors Acting" book. Or go freeze frame through an episode of "Everybody Loves Raymond" and capture each change of Brad Garrett. (I love the facial acting in that show - some of the best!)